Hockey: The Irish Men's Hockey team finished eighth at the BDO World Cup qualifier tournament in China today, having lost their final match 2-1 against Belgium in the 7th-8th playoff tie.
"While we are disappointed not to have got a result today our performances over the two weeks of this tournament, especially our draw with Pakistan; currently fifth in the world rankings, have proved we are very competitive at this level", remarked Irish manager Steven Hiles after the game.
"With Olympic qualification on the horizon next year we must now build on what we've achieved here with the European Championships in September 2007 in mind", he continued.
Early pressure from the Belgian forwards yielded the opening goal on sixteen minutes, when Jean-Philippe Brule converted from the fist penalty corner of the game.
Ireland was forced to do a considerable amount of defending for the remainder of the half not getting many chances to breach Belgium's resolute defence. For the opening ten minutes after the break both teams traded chances but Belgium increased their lead on forty eight minutes when an inch perfect long ball split the Irish defence and was slotted in by BenjaminVan Hove.
Ireland countered with Glennane's Stephen Butler leading the charge and were rewarded a minute from time when Lisnagarvey's Tim Cockram hit the back of the Belgian net from a well worked Irish penalty corner.
The Irish comeback was too late however and Belgium held on to claim seventh spot, leaving Ireland eighth overall from a starting position of 12th at the beginning of the tournament.
France and Japan play off for the final qualification spot tomorrow. England, Pakistan, New Zealand and Korea have already secured their passages to the World Cup in September by claiming the four other spots available in China.
Despite narrowly missing out on a qualification berth for this year's World Cup the Irish team will earn valuable world ranking points from their performances in Changzhou.